Harper > Recent Status Updates

So far, I’ve not liked the first protagonist. All I can say is that I pity her. But she doesn’t particularly engage me as a compelling subject, which is a shame, because I find it can take me out of what seems to be below the surface? Or am I reading into it something that’s not quite there?

Sometimes I’ve found the dialogue clunky and a touch polemic, which is odd; Adichie is clearly a very talented writer.

Really enjoying this; it is hard work, but well worth it. I’ll be stuck at this for a long while before finishing!

Each sonnet I have to read several times and make notes of to get the most out of it, but when you get into it, the song in the language is incredibly striking.

Just read S.18, the famous: “Shall I compare thee to a Summer’s day?” and it honestly had my heart racing.

Listening to the BBC radio series narrated by Julie Andrews - which is really entertaining and worth a listen, but you do have to put up with music and sound effects. Quite disappointing if you’re expecting an audiobook, but understandable for the episodic radio format.

Andrews does, however, serve as a really engaging narrator; her intonation brings the text to life wonderfully.

I’m really enjoying this! I thought it would be more of a slog than it is.

I think there’s some beautiful turns of phrase and Virgil’s imagery is truly palpable in places. It suits the more casual read that I’m doing.

I’m enjoying the translation of this edition, but wish the cover was nicer - but that is on brand for Wordsworth Classics.

you have to be nuts to do world building like this. really enjoyable so far!

Leticia, thank you so much for this beautiful book. already got through the first 100 pages two days in. Le Guin is at her transportive and profound best already. Reminding me a lot of my favourite Earthsea book, the Tombs of Atuan. And it is really interesting to see her playing more directly with literary modes and meta-textual themes. I’m not ready for when the proverbial hits the fan later in the plot!

she’s just married god - but the edition hasn’t said yet what her human husband thinks of it.

finding this very amusing when considering unreliable narrators, yet fascinating considering medieval attitudes to mystics, faith, pilgrimage, sex (not as prudish about it as i expected!)

margery is every bit emotionally off the rails, every bit ferverently faithful, her account seems shrewdly presented and well kept

im enjoying this! i’ve not read contemporary fiction in a long while

i thought the first section (approx 15 pages) was a bit of a hard sell. the immediate style of minimal punctuation does deliver well later on, but this first section is very layered and didn’t draw me in right away.

“us” was beautifully done, capturing the joy of transformational love, and couching it in ovid’s iphis’s tale gorgeously